The Simple Things
by weebee
Summary: Kuno slips Ranma a chemical that is supposed to remove all inhibitions, in order to get the pigtailed girl to profess her love for him. This makes all involved rather uncomfortable, but surprisingly, there are no fatalities.


The Simple Things

Summary: Kuno slips Ranma a chemical that is supposed to remove all inhibitions, in order to get the pigtailed girl to profess her love for him. This makes all involved rather uncomfortable, but surprisingly, there are no fatalities.

Special thanks to Gstimso, for help with the plotting and many phrase suggestions, along with James Axelrad and Jonakhensu for beta reading and several others who told me I should post this rather than just letting it sit.

I hope you all enjoy it.

Part 1.

Tatewaki Kuno looked upon the vial before him in a state of near awe. "This… is it?" he asked, reaching out and grasping the object tenderly.

His twisted sister sniffed and crossed her arms over her chest. "Why of course, Brother dear, it's exactly what you asked of me," she responded. "This solution will completely remove all hesitation and impulse control from its subject. If your pigtailed girl truly does love you, she will attack and ravish you where you stand, most likely… that or she will drop dead, but either way, it will force her away from my Ranma-sama."

"Excellent!" Kuno proclaimed, holding the vial up in the air, seemingly oblivious to his sister's final few comments. "Indeed, both you and Saotome shall see that true love can not be withstood, and the Pigtailed Girl shall be mine!"

"That's… nice, brother dear," Kodachi said, as she witnessed her older sibling burst into a maniacal laugh. "Now, leave me, I must contemplate what I will do with Ranma-sama once that harlot is out of the way. Maybe the black wedding dress again, or…"

Her contemplation was interrupted when a person cleared their throat nearby. "Kuno-san, could you please sit down so that I may continue teaching?" the history teacher asked from the front of the room, trying to ignore the fact that one of his students was talking of drugging another from a different class, while his sister hung outside the window.

"I do not have time for that, Sensei!" Kuno proclaimed, turning away from Kodachi and charging across the room, knocking desks aside as he passed. "Pigtailed Girl, I come for thee!"

"Good luck, brother dear!" Kodachi called, before letting out one of her trademark maniacal laughs and dropping from the window, only to recover herself on the way to the ground, and bound directly to the school wall.

Inside, she heard the sound of several loud crashes, before her brother came sailing out the window of the classroom she knew to be her Ranma-sama's, and fell headfirst into the pool. Jumping to the ground, she sighed and decided that she needed to take things into her own hands.

HR.

"Freakin' moron," Ranma grumbled, as he sat casually at his usual desk, scowling out the window where he'd just sent Tatewaki Kuno. "Wonder why he's lookin' for my girl side this time?"

"Probably just wants to give you another love letter," Akane said from her desk next to his, "he tried to give me one this morning. Of course I smacked the idiot into orbit."

"Grk," the pigtailed martial artist replied, his face turning very slightly green, before Hinako-sensei walked in, her fighting fish under one arm and an irritated look on her face.

"All right class, we're going to do an English dictation quiz today!" the woman announced loudly. "I want you all to write, 'You should give Hinako-sensei's candy back to her right now!' in English, and send it to that mean old Parent-Teacher Association leader, Mrs. Takahashi."

Ranma rolled his eyes. "This class's gunna be educational," he muttered, but he apparently did so too loudly, as the teacher glared at him.

"Saotome, detention this afternoon," she declared, and then grew a malicious grin. "I think the room needs its windows washed down!"

"Damn it," the gender cursed individual muttered, scowling at Akane as she gave him a disapproving look. Sighing, he retrieved his school supplies from his desk and started to write the letter to the PTA, thanking them for depriving his teacher of the sweets, as she was much better able to teach while not on a sugar high.

He knew that this would likely get him more discipline later, but since she'd just sentenced him to about half an hour of working with cold water, in full view of some of the guys who'd like to see girl-Ranma in a wet shirt — an inevitable outcome given Jusenkyo's liking for cold water — he felt it was worth it.

Just as he was finishing the note, Tatewaki Kuno ran into the room again, still soaked from Ranma having hit him into the pool earlier. "Saotome, I repeat, where is the pigtailed godde…" He started, but was silenced when Miss Hinako, still irritated by both what had apparently happened at a teachers' meeting earlier and Ranma's reaction to her reaction to it, turned and drained him into unconsciousness. "I fight…" he tried to proclaim, before ending in a massive yawn, and hitting the floor like a limp noodle.

"Y'know," Ranma whispered to Akane, "Sometimes I wonder what a normal school'd be like."

Akane chuckled in spite of herself.

HR.

"You could at least help, y'know," observed Ranma, as she continued to scrub down the classroom windows. She'd been assigned to do this job at least six times in her two years at the school, and somehow the things managed to get smudged up enough in the times between that she had to actually work on them for a while, since scrubbing them quickly and hard enough to clean them properly would have broken them.

"Nah, we're enjoying the scenery," Hiroshi said, as he and Daisuke sat at two desks, writing in their notebooks and looking appreciatively up at the little redhead on occasion.

"Besides, we're your best friends, we wouldn't want to leave you alone in here," Daisuke continued, "but we've got to get our homework done by tomorrow, remember?"

"Yeah sure, ya jerks," she returned, but smiled at them anyways. "You two got any idea what Kuno was after earlier? He ran in here about six times."

"Probably just being Kuno," Hiroshi said, writing an answer down on the math assignment before him. "Wanted to see his pigtailed goddess, most likely, the perverted idiot."

"Hey, perverted idiots ain't allowed to insult their own kind, are they?" asked Ranma with a grin.

"Urk," Hiroshi proclaimed, bringing one hand to his heart as if to clutch it in pain, then wincing for real as he accidentally poked himself with the pointed end of his pencil. Trying not to reveal his mistake, he continued, "You're talking to a guy who's actually got a date with Yuka next Saturday. Obviously some people think I'm better than Kuno."

"How'd you manage that?" Ranma asked, dumping her cleaning rag into the bucket of water next to her, and waiting for it to soak up some more of the cold, soapy fluid before plucking it back out. At least it wasn't quite black with dirt yet.

"I asked her," Hiroshi said.

"You know, how you could get a date with Akane, if you tried," Daisuke said.

"I don't…" the martial artist said, before biting back her automatic denial. "Damn it, you guys know why I ain't gunna do that."

"Yeah, because you're a cow…" Daisuke began to say something that would probably have earned him a high speed washcloth to the head, but fortunately for his dry clothes and homework, something interrupted his statement.

"Ohohohohohoho!" Kodachi Kuno's voice echoed through the classroom, her maniacal laugh actually causing the windows to rattle slightly in their frames, as she danced in wearing a Furinkan girls' uniform. She was carrying a tray of what looked like cookies, with a glass of water on the side.

"Oh man, Kodachi," Ranma groaned, accidentally slapping herself in the forehead with her washcloth. Irritably dropping the thing and clearing the now grimy, soapy hair out of her eyes, she demanded, "What do you want?"

The younger Kuno sibling opened her mouth several times, apparently trying to pick her words, and then said, "I wished to come and offer you a peace offering."

"You what?" Ranma asked, and the jaws of the two boys nearby could almost be heard as they dropped.

"I feel that what was done at the wedding of my dear Ranma-sama and Akane Tendo, where I attacked you along with the other girls, was wrong. You were only trying to stop the atrocity as well, were you not?" the Black Rose proclaimed, causing Ranma to sweat drop heavily.

"Um, Kodachi, it's not…" she started, but was silenced by the black-haired girl putting the tray of cookies on a desk in front of Daisuke, who backed away from it as if it were radioactive. Ranma tried to do so as well, but her stomach growled, as she'd forgotten her lunch today.

"Don't worry, none of my usual… additives are present," the gymnast said, completely truthfully.

"I dunno," Ranma said, but her stomach continued to argue in favour of eating anything edible.

"You can't be serious," Daisuke started, and Hiroshi nodded along with him. "Remember last time? We were knocked out for three days!"

"Please, the honour of house Kuno demands that I do this," Kodachi said, opening her eyes wide and looking at Ranma as sincerely as she could. Strangely, the trick she normally only used on her father and brother to get her way seemed to be working, as the redhead looked away for a moment, before scooping one of the cookies up, and taking a massive bite out of it.

All four of the people in the room stopped for several seconds, no motion present other than the redhead's jaw working as she chewed the baked food, and swallowed it. "Wow, these are pretty good!" she announced, surprised, and then experimentally flexed her arm.

"Yes, they are," Kodachi agreed, plucking one of the cookies up herself and biting into it.

The two boys in the room watched both girls for ill effects for a moment, and then Hiroshi tentatively reached out to grab one himself, followed by his friend. That was about when the floodgates opened, and like all good chocolate chip cookies, they were gone before anyone knew it.

"Thanks, Kodachi, those were great," Ranma said, picking up the glass of water that had been on the edge of the tray and guzzling it quickly to clear her throat.

"I am glad, Pigtailed One," Kodachi announced. "In future, I hope that we don't work at cross purposes."

Ranma blinked. "Cross what?" but was ignored as the Black Rose ran across the room, discarding her Furinkan high uniform in the process, and out one of the windows that Ranma had been cleaning… a closed one. The martial artist's eyebrow twitched, but she let out a long sigh and started sweeping up the glass. Seeing her annoyance, her two friends finally packed their homework away and started to help.

HR.

"How in the world could that idiot brother of mine have made a mistake that grievous?" Kodachi Kuno demanded, as a white ambulance pulled away from Furinkan high school, Tatewaki Kuno having been wheeled inside a few moments before, squeaking several octaves higher than normal about his pigtailed goddess.

It appeared that her moronic brother's plan had failed, and that the pigtailed girl was still at large. Still, given the effects of the drug she'd been given, it was entirely possible that she would take herself out of the equation some other way, or with some other man. While she was there, however, she decided that she may as well wait for her Ranma-sama. Sasuke had told her that he had come to the school and hadn't left yet.

"Ah, there is my beloved!" she crowed, as she saw the pigtailed man walking from the building, the two boys she'd seen with the red-haired harlot walking alongside him. They were both giving him slightly odd looks, but he didn't seem to notice. "Oh, Ranma-sama! How glorious it is to see you!" she proclaimed, jumping down from the tree she had been hiding in and onto the school grounds.

"Um, hey again, Kodachi," Ranma said, nervously, as she was giving him a much more predatory look this time than she had before.

"We are alone," she declared, ignoring the comment of 'What are we, chopped liver?' from one of the other boys, "we could go and…" Not bothering to say any more, she ran forward, throwing her arms around his neck.

"Kodachi, get the hell offa me," Ranma snarled, looking around for the impending blunt, heavy object from Akane, or sharp weapon from Shampoo or Ukyo.

"But why, Ranma darling? The ugly Tendo girl is already at her foul little hovel of a home, and the red-haired harridan is likely already with another man, we are the only ones that matter."

Ranma's eyebrow twitched. Appearing to suddenly make up his mind, he grabbed one of Kodachi's arms, and yanked. She yelped at the strain before she was forced to let go of his neck, and looked up at him from a few steps away with big, shiny and confused eyes. "I really wish ya wouldn't insult me like that," he growled.

"Insult you? I haven't…" Kodachi trailed off, confused.

"You just called me a harridan, 'n' I dunno what that means, but it don't sound good," Ranma complained.

"I'm not certain either, to tell the truth," Kodachi admitted, her confusion overriding her normal responses, "but it's what my brother traditionally calls me when he's particularly vexed with me…" Shaking her head, she continued, "But that isn't important right now, I do not call you that, I say it of the pigtailed wench!"

"Okay, I DO know what that one means," Ranma growled. "Look, you idiot, me 'n' the pigtailed girl are the same person. I've got a curse that changes my gender when I'm splashed with water."

"But that… no, that cannot be," Kodachi proclaimed, and Ranma seemed to snap. He marched forward, reaching out to grab her arm. Normally, Kodachi would have welcomed this, but she was still trying to process what he'd just said. Suddenly, things started to make a sick sort of sense, events falling into place. Hell, if she were to admit it to herself, she had been able to see the similarities of their fighting styles for months now — that had been one of the things that infuriated her about the redhead.

In her confusion, she fell back on a reliable tactic. She threw off her second school uniform of the day, revealing her battle leotard, and flicked a ribbon out to entangle the threat. Ranma just raised one hand, catching the end of the ribbon just as the redhead had done on their first meeting, and pulled hard.

Several busy moments later, Kodachi found herself wrapped up like a cocoon and hanging from a tree, the only things free being her head and one arm. At least she was the right way up. "Why'd I think explainin' to a Kuno'd work?" Ranma sneered. "You're all freaking insane morons. Look, just hang here a second 'n' I'll get some water."

Kodachi just swung there, swaying back and forth in the wind slightly, and trying to think of precisely what was going on. Ranma-sama and the pigtailed girl were the same person? This she still wasn't convinced of, but if it were true, it would explain something. Ranma-sama never normally acted like this, but if he were suffering under the concoction that she'd given the redhead in her water… The young Kuno went pale, unsure whether what she'd just realized was a good thing or a bad one, but knowing that it hadn't been what she'd intended.

Worse yet, she recalled what he'd said. "'You're all freaking insane morons,' " she muttered to herself. If what he'd said about the girl and himself were true, then he could not lie, or at least, wouldn't have any reason to. As she saw the redhead approaching, a glass of water in her hand, tears began to well up in her eyes, but the girl ignored them, grabbing her one free hand and placing it on her right breast.

"What in the world are you…" Kodachi asked, indignantly, but the words died in her throat as the girl lifted the glass of water, dumping it over her head, and her flesh rippled, shifted, and seemed to change in Kodachi's hand until she was resting it against Ranma-sama's hard chest, covered only in his silk shirt.

"Now do ya get it, Kodachi?" he demanded, but she was unable to nod or speak. Her entire throat was choked up, and her eyes obscured with tears. He turned away, walking towards the school gates and leaving her hanging there, tears slowly trickling down her cheeks.

HR.

Shampoo, proud hunter of the Joketsuzoku, had spotted her prey. She hadn't actually come out looking for her Airen on this delivery, but when she'd seen him walking home a full hour and a half later than usual, she couldn't help the desire to ask once more for a date. It was true that he'd been furious at everyone after the wedding disaster, but she was sure that he would understand why she had to do it, at least after she explained it to him.

Convulsing her legs beneath her, she caused her bike to leap from the rooftop she was riding along to another, in blatant defiance of the laws of physics, and began lining up her pounce. This was a very careful manoeuvre, calculated to track her husband's movements exactly, so that she didn't miss and end up smashing into the ground. That would be too, too embarrassing.

Counting silently to herself, the purple haired girl leapt again just as Ranma was entering an obstruction free stretch of sidewalk, ringing her bell as she came down. Ranma tried to turn, as usual, but as physics demonstrated that it was still in the game by bringing the bike down at an acceleration of 9.80665 meters per second squared, his skull nevertheless ended up being slammed side-on into the pavement.

"Hello Airen, you take Shampoo on date now?" the bubbly girl asked, as she balanced the bike atop the other martial artist.

"Wouldja get off me?" Ranma snarled, and the Amazon obligingly rode forward, dismounting her machine right after she got off of Ranma. Needless to say, she was quite shocked when the other martial artist sprang to his feet and snatched the bike away from her, holding it up so that the pedals were in front of his face, which still bore the imprint of the sidewalk.

"What you do, Airen?" she asked, nervously.

"What I've wanted to do since the third or fourth time I saw this thing," Ranma responded, his face suddenly splitting into a disturbingly manic grin that she'd only ever seen during the ultimate weakness moxibustion incident.

"And what… what that?" Shampoo asked, backing away slightly. Her question wasn't answered verbally, however, but through actions, as Ranma's grip convulsed and the bike's frame let off a screech of tortured metal. Pulling his arms apart violently, the bottom portion of the frame separated cleanly, and he moved one hand to grab a wheel.

Shampoo watched in horrified fascination as her prospective husband began to slowly, violently, and extremely happily destroy her bike. At about the time when he ripped the rear wheel off and sent it flying into the air over the canal next to the street, she turned around and started running, only barely catching it out of the corner of her eye when he launched a chi blast at the scattered wreckage.

Looking around after he was finished with the destruction, the pigtailed martial artist blinked. "Huh, Shampoo? I thought ya wanted to go on a date?" he asked, but then shrugged and wandered off.

HR.

Ukyo hummed to herself as she put out the sign for her restaurant. She had wanted to open earlier, but Tsubasa had shown up disguised as a sandwich board and she'd had to deal with him first. Normally Konatsu kept the little rat from infesting the place but he was off at some ninja convention or something. He hadn't told her that, but she had seen him leaving the city with a couple of other ninja from the local area.

As she was straightening the sign so that it hung down correctly, she heard the sound of running feet, and then someone stopping suddenly. Turning, she saw Shampoo standing on the street, panting deeply. She growled. "Shampoo, what are you doing here?"

"Shampoo want warn Spatula girl, Husband too, too angry," the Amazon reported quickly. "He destroy Shampoo's bike."

The okonomiyaki chef couldn't help but snicker at that. "Well, if you didn't land it on his head all the time, sugar, maybe he wouldn't—"

She was cut off as Shampoo spoke up, "Ukyo no understand, Ranma tear to pieces, think maybe angry about wedding. Shampoo no like spatula girl, but no want see Airen kill! After all, Airen like Shampoo, what he do to you after wedding?"

The brunette cross-dresser's eyebrow twitched. "Just get lost, Shampoo, I know how to handle Ranma," she proclaimed.

"No say Shampoo not warn you," the purple-haired girl returned, before running off again, muttering something about telling her great-grandmother.

HR.

Ranma was almost home, and he was feeling great. In fact, he felt better than he had in quite a while, and it was all because he'd finally done a few things that had been driving him nuts for months. He honestly couldn't understand why he hadn't done them before, since they were so obvious.

Now, however, he had something even better to look forward to. He had Kasumi's cooking on the horizon, and then maybe a nice, relaxing afternoon of lazing around. It was going to be great, or at least, that was what he thought right up until the wave of water hit him in the face.

Slowly, the red-haired martial artist turned to see what had tossed the water at her, already knowing from long experience. There stood an old woman, about as wrinkled up and withered as Happosai or Cologne, merrily spreading water over the sidewalk while looking straight down at her feet. In fact, as the pigtailed girl stood there, she was hit in the face with another ladle's worth of water. Reaching out slowly, she grasped the dipper and pulled it out of the old woman's hand, which gave little resistance.

"Hmm, is there something wrong?" the elder asked, her eyes finally meeting Ranma's, or almost so. They seemed to be clouded, and were flickering around in random directions.

"I'll say there's somethin' wrong," Ranma snarled, and then broke the ladle in her hands with a loud crack. "Do ya have any idea what it's like for me ta walk along here and get hit by yer water every couple days?"

"Hmm?" the woman asked, "I'm sorry, young lady, I didn't know I was hitting anyone."

"Young lady? And that's part o' the problem," Ranma started, apparently on a rant. "I've dunno if you've somehow missed it, but I've changed forms right in front of ya a couple hundred times. I'm a guy, damn it! I've gotten used to the curse since I first got it, but for the first little while every time I changed inta this, it made me sick, and there ya are, with that damned ladle of yours, ready to do it to me before school, then I have to deal with KUNO wearing wet silk! That bastard shouldn't be allowed 'round any girl, let alone ones who're supposed ta be guys, and who he gives goddamned screamin' nightmares!"

The old woman seemed to process that for a moment, and then she bowed to the young martial artist. "Oh, I'm sorry dear, my hearing's been going recently, so I haven't been as good at the martial arts sonar style I use to compensate for my sight. Gender changing curse, hmm? I am sorry about that, but maybe if you made more noise?" she suggested, solicitously.

"Oh, um… sight…" Ranma said, and suddenly the way the woman's eyes were moving made sense. "Aw crap," she muttered, scratching the back of her neck. "Um, yeah, I'll make more noise, thanks," she said, and was about to turn away when an idea hit, and like everything else this afternoon, she acted on it. "I don't suppose I could learn that martial arts sonar thing, could I?"

The old lady's face broke into a broad smile at this. "Of course, dear, we can discuss it over tea tomorrow, if you'd like," she said, and Ranma nodded, walking off towards the Tendo home.

HR.

"Damn you Ranma, that was probably your fault too," Ryoga mumbled, as he removed the smashed and slightly bent wheel from where it sat around his neck. Holding it up, he studied it and decided that it probably came from a bicycle, or a rickshaw, but since he didn't see skyscrapers, he probably wasn't in Cambodia. In fact, it looked almost like he was in Nerima, but he didn't really want to get his hopes up again. Besides, he'd been trying to get away from both Akane and Akari recently, if only because the former had a good chance of killing him if she found out about his curse, and the latter's pig obsession was starting to make him feel a little uncomfortable.

Turning the corner, he realized he was right not to get his hopes up. He was definitely at the back entrance to the Tendo place, but to balance that fact out, Ranma Saotome was walking towards him. "Ranma," he growled, feeling a little too tired at the moment to attack the redhead directly.

The other martial artist stopped in her tracks for a moment, and her eyes seemed to glaze. Shaking her head, she smiled at him. "Heya, P-chan!" she exclaimed, running up to him and throwing an arm around his shoulders.

"Gwa?" The larger martial artist asked, as his worst enemy and rival hung off of him, smiling up at him with sparkling eyes.

"Where ya been?" she asked, just as jovially as her first exclamation. "I've been doin' really good today. I got one o' the Kunos to maybe learn about my curse, and I destroyed Shampoo's bike, 'n' I found out why that old lady keeps splashing me, and I could learn a new technique, and…"

"Gwa," Ryoga repeated, and then tried to regain control of the situation. "Ranma, why are you doing this? It's not going to work!"

"Doing what? I'm just talking to my worst enemy, so, where ya been? You go to Canada again?" the redhead asked, and started moving in closer to the Lost Boy.

By this point, Ryoga was sweating bullets, and waiting for the other shoe to drop. He knew that Ranma always had some plan to embarrass him, and he knew that she would unleash it at any minute. Or, maybe, this was her plan, to make him try and puzzle out her plan until he went insane.

"Stop it Ranma, it's not going to work! I'll never fall for your tricks again!" he exclaimed, trying to pull his arm away from Ranma, which worked, right up until she wrapped her legs around his waist and started hugging his shoulder.

"C'mon Ryoga, don't be mean, let's hang out!" the smaller martial artist insisted, looking up at him and pouting.

"Um…" the Hibiki, who was much more lost than usual, said, right before the other shoe that he was waiting for finally dropped.

"Ranma, what in the world are you doing?!" Akane yelled, dropping the bag of garbage she'd been carrying out via the dojo's challenge gate in shock.

"Oh, hey 'Kane!" Ranma said, waving at the blue-black–haired girl.

At this point, Akane's mind started to try and figure out what was going on. Ranma was hanging off of Ryoga, and looked happy about it. In fact, she almost looked as happy as she had during the whole Koi Rod fiasco. Ryoga was petrified, and he looked even more so now than he had when she'd first seen the two. She'd been trying recently to give Ranma the benefit of the doubt more often, since it had seemed like it was very rarely his fault in the end when stuff like this happened, but judging by how she'd just reacted, Ranma was perfectly happy where she was.

"Ranma, let Ryoga go!" she demanded, aghast.

"Aww, but I like it here," Ranma returned, somewhat sulkily.

"Akane, this isn't what it looks like," Ryoga stammered, knowing how little good it did for Ranma to say the same.

"Let him go now, and stop acting like an idiot, or I'll make you let go!" Akane threatened, her teeth clenching. When Ranma shook her head petulantly, the youngest Tendo readied a punch, lashing out at Ranma as quickly as she could.

What she wasn't expecting was that Ranma would release Ryoga's shoulder with one hand, grab her own outstretched fist, and pull her into a one-armed hug. "What— what the hell are you doing?!" she sputtered, indignantly.

"Y'know, I really like you, tomboy, but smackin' me ain't exactly fiancée-like behaviour," Ranma said, and then leaned up to kiss the larger girl on the cheek. Akane just started sputtering as Ranma let her legs down from Ryoga's waist, and led the two into the compound's front yard.

Ryoga, for his part, was trying his hardest not to bleed copiously from the nose or destroy the nearest thirty city blocks with a Shi Shi Hokodan, when Soun and Genma spotted the three. For a moment, large smiles grew on the two elders' faces, until they noticed that Ranma was hugging Ryoga, as well as Akane.

"What in the world are you doing, boy?!" the redhead's father demanded, his chest puffing out in indignation.

"Aw, be quiet, ya stupid panda," Ranma returned, and as Genma was about to charge at his son to teach her the importance of respecting her elders, he was abruptly smacked in the face by a rather large Moko Takabisha.

Soun looked between his friend and the pigtailed martial artist for a moment, before deciding that it would be best for him to make himself scarce. It was at about this time that Akane recovered slightly, snapping out of the shock she'd been in at Ranma's declaration of… well, it wasn't quite love, but… whatever it was, and yanked her arm away from the smaller girl.

"What on Earth's wrong with you, Ranma?" she asked, actually quite worried now. Ranma wasn't acting like she normally did, and that was probably the largest understatement ever.

"Oh, I'm fine 'Kane," the other martial artist replied, still tugging the incredibly confused Ryoga along as she started for the stairs. "You comin'?"

"Um, what are you going to do?" the now quite apprehensive youngest Tendo daughter asked, following her fiancé as she started up the stairs.

Ranma was about to respond, when a new voice interjected. "Oh my, welcome home Ranma-kun, I didn't think you would be here for supper when you weren't here an hour ago," Kasumi Tendo said, sticking her head out from the kitchen.

"Hey Kasumi, can you bring supper upstairs? I'm going to be sort of busy," she asked, giving the eldest Tendo a beatific smile. Akane and Ryoga had the strangest impression, just for a moment, that Kasumi was standing in two places at once.

Kasumi nodded slowly, taking note of Ranma's face and drawing several quick conclusions. The redhead's eyes were very badly constricted, almost to pinpricks, and there was a light sheen of sweat on her forehead. "Of course, Ranma-kun." She drew back into the kitchen, immediately searching for the copies she'd made of certain sections of Tofu-sensei's medical texts.

Ranma, meanwhile, was almost at the top of the stairs, and Akane was starting to get annoyed again. "What do you have to do up here that's so damned important, Ranma?" she asked, and then glared over at the nearly catatonic Lost Boy. "And would you say something, Ryoga?"

"The world is a dark and lonely place, and I need to stop thinking these thoughts," Ryoga mumbled, in a quiet monotone.

Akane blanched, growled, and contemplated trying to deck Ranma again. Unfortunately, the redhead had caught her punch effortlessly last time, and she could end up in that embarrassing hold again if she tried it. Then again, hugging Ranma had felt a little nice, but… She shook her head. Thinking that way wasn't going to get her any closer to answers to the question of what was wrong with Ranma, even if it did relieve a little stress. "Hey, wait, where are you going?" she asked, as she saw Ranma heading for the dark-haired girl's own bedroom door.

HR.

"One hundred thirty thousand, four hundred and twenty-five yen," Nabiki Tendo mumbled to herself, staring at the large pile of money that was sitting on her desk. It was the last few weeks' earnings from the various betting pools and picture selling rings she had running, and she had a very specific use for it. "Soon, it will be mine," she said, and tried to resist an evil laugh. Shaking her head, she reflected that hanging around in the vicinity of Genma Saotome and Happosai was probably bad for her sanity.

Quickly jotting the figure she'd come up with in her ledger, Nabiki briefly let herself indulge in fantasies of the new computer system she was going to buy, perfect for digging up information online and manipulating photos, when a tremendous smashing sound came from Akane's room, followed by the usual shout of "What are you doing, you pervert?!"

Curious, the middle Tendo got to her feet, grabbing the money and sticking it in a shirt pocket until she could hide it later, and scooping her camera up from where it sat on her bedside table, ready for any situation. When she got to Akane's open doorway, the brown-haired girl almost let the device fall from suddenly numb fingers at what she saw. "Now this is new," she said, plastering an amused smirk onto her face in order to cover her shock.

From Akane's bed, Ranma waved at her happily, completely naked and looking vaguely as if she were drunk.

"Nabiki, help! The idiot's gone insane!" Akane yelled, from where she was sitting on the bed as well, a bed sheet tied in such a way that her arms and legs were totally immobilized. This wasn't really surprising, as she'd actually been running a betting pool on how long it would take Ranma to finally seduce Akane, and figured her younger sister might actually get less uptight if it happened. What made the oldest girl in the room's eyes bulge was the fact that Ryoga was laying on the other side of the redhead from Akane, passed out with a copiously bleeding nose.

"Sorry sis, but a situation like this only comes up a few times in your life, you know," Nabiki said, raising her camera to her eyes and sighting through it.

"Nabiki, how could you?!" Akane yelped, her eyes filling with horror, as she desperately struggled against her bonds. "Why aren't you helping me?! Get the pervert out of here!"

"Yeah, Nabiki, how could you?" Ranma asked, in just as betrayed a tone as Akane's, absently shifting one leg closer to each of her companions in such a way that Nabiki was left with absolutely no doubt that she was a natural redhead.

"These are going to be worth a FORTUNE!" Nabiki thought gleefully.

Unaware, Ranma continued, "You got any idea how humiliatin' those pictures are? Doin' that ain't exactly nice, ya know."

"Says the pervert who's tied me up and is cuddling naked with me," Akane growled, but Ranma didn't seem to hear, as she stared at Nabiki, who was busily sighting for the perfect shot.

"Well, business is business, Saotome, and I don't know how you can talk in your current position," the middle Tendo returned, and then promptly yelped when a wave of Ranma's hand and a strange air distortion caused a large fraction of her camera to part company in a downward direction.

Almost completely dumbstruck, Nabiki pulled the eyepiece away from her face, looking down at the ground to see that the lens assembly and most of the film compartment were both lying in pieces on the floor, cut apart as by swirling knives, and leaving only the viewfinder and flash in her hands. The middle Tendo gulped, hard.

Deep down she had always known, from what her father had told her, that no martial artist would harm one weaker than themselves. This had actually encouraged her training routine, one meant to keep her looking sexy without increasing her physical power one bit. After all, Nerima was almost completely free of petty criminals, mostly due to the efforts of its proliferation of martial artists, so gaining any self defence skill would only open her up to irritating challenges.

Now, though, Ranma had just used a technique, one she'd never seen, to destroy her camera almost effortlessly, and was still lounging on Akane's bed, her face set in an irritated look. This changed everything, and abruptly left the brown-haired girl scrabbling for purchase in a completely new game, especially since Akane was apparently half-way approving of her fiancé's abrupt action, looking at Nabiki as if she'd betrayed her.

"Uh, Saotome, I… I'm sorry," The mercenary backpedalled, knowing when grovelling was in order. "I didn't mean to interrupt… whatever… you're doing, and I'll… just…" She started sidling towards the door, doing a remarkable imitation of Ranma's father, when the redhead held up one hand.

"Hey, 'Biki?" She asked, causing the other girl's eyebrow to twitch. Seeing her stop dead, the redhead asked, "That money there, you get it from sellin' pictures of me 'n' 'Kane, or something?"

HR.

Kasumi looked worriedly at her younger sister, as Nabiki staggered from Akane's room, her eyes glassy and with very dishevelled hair. "All… gone?" the middle Tendo croaked, clutching something to her chest.

"Nabiki-chan, are you all right?" the eldest Tendo daughter asked, concerned.

"Oh, I… I'm…" Nabiki stammered, and then turned haunted eyes towards the taller girl. "I'm doomed."

Kasumi considered following her sister as she retreated to her room, but decided against it, recalling the symptoms she'd seen on Ranma's face, and what her books had said about them. At the moment, her other sister and her fiancé were in more danger.

Opening Akane's bedroom door, the eldest Tendo gasped as she saw Ranma pulling Akane's dress off over her head, the blue-black–haired girl blushing furiously and squirming desperately, but too firmly tied up to do anything. "Oh my, Ranma-chan, what are you doing?!" she gasped, moving one hand up to her mouth.

"Oh, hi Kasumi," Ranma said, turning her head away from her task, "It's so warm in here, I thought Akane could cool down, like I did!"

"Warm?" Kasumi asked, noting that the room was rather cool for the time of the year, but also that the redhead's face was badly flushed.

"That's just an excuse, you pervert, now leave my clothes alone!" Akane squawked, indignantly.

"But it's not, 'Kane, mine were covered in sweat, that's why I took 'em off," Ranma explained, as if it were the most reasonable thing in the world. "Hey, Kasumi, how can you stand the heat in that heavy apron?"

"I'm, erm, fine, Ranma-kun," Kasumi said, coughing into her hand and turning away as Ranma started on the unconscious Ryoga's shirt. "I don't think you're fine, though. We really should get you to the doctor's, you know."

The redhead shrugged. "Nah, I'm fine," she dismissed. "Just a little hot." Then, she shivered. "Then again, now I'm kinda cold."

"No, Ranma, really. You aren't feeling well, you could be…" Kasumi started, but was silenced as the redhead began snuggling closely to her sister on her right, and then reached out to grab Ryoga on her left and pulled him into the group. Kasumi opened and closed her mouth a few times in stunned disbelief, completely out of her depth.

Meanwhile, even in her current state, Ranma could not help but notice Ryoga's lack of responsiveness. Laying him back on the bed, she leaned over his prone form and lightly slapped his cheek until he woke up in bewilderment. Since this was Ryoga, the light slaps needed to be such as would bruise the bones of anyone else; but Ranma knew what she was doing, even if she couldn't quite remember why.

Since Ranma hadn't let go of the trussed-up Akane with her other arm to carry out this operation, the Lost Boy returned to consciousness to the highly unexpected sight of two pretty girls leaning closely over him — wearing one pair of panties between them and not a stitch else, he discovered on trying clumsily to get up and flee. He managed to stay coherent long enough to realize that he was himself mysteriously shirtless, and promptly passed out again. Ranma pouted, then stared in surprise at the front of his trousers as he landed back in his supine position. "Huh. Yours does that too? Weird!" she muttered, then shrugged and leant back to her right to snuggle with Akane instead. Fortunately, her fiancée was too busy freaking out that a boy she knew had seen her essentially nude to register the quiet comment.

"See, 'Sumi-chan, I'm totally comfy," the smaller girl proclaimed happily. "So, 'Kane, you wanna…" she trailed off, looking at the blue-black–haired girl suggestively.

"No, I don't, you pervert!" Akane shrieked, and renewed her struggles to get free of her bonds.

"Oh, fine, I'll talk to Kasumi and P-chan here, then," Ranma said, and prodded Ryoga in the side of his shirtless torso. "Hey P-chan, you gonna wake up?"

"Guh?" Ryoga asked, as his eyes flickered open again, suddenly shooting wide enough that Kasumi half-wondered if his eyeballs would stay in. He momentarily glimpsed a nerve-wracking expanse of soft, female flesh in two subtly different tones, but sat up and frantically pulled his vision away to instead stare at Kasumi, who was at the door and looking impassively in at the three. "What's going on here?" he squeaked, his voice several octaves too high.

His state of mind only destabilized further when he felt Ranma's upper body rubbing against his, the redhead turning towards him and asking, in a quiet, sleepy, almost sultry voice, "So, you learn any neat new techniques recently?"

In her unwilling — if enjoyable, though she would never have admitted it even to herself — position against Ranma's other side, Akane would have fallen over if she could have. "You want to talk?" she asked incredulously. "You ran up to my room, dragging Ryoga, stripped, tied me up and stripped us both to talk?!"

"Why?" Ranma asked, turning towards her and blinking several times. "Is there something else I'm supposed to do?"

"Yes!" Akane said, and then clamped her mouth shut, realizing what she'd just said. "I… I mean, no! Nothing else! Absolutely, definitely nothing else!"

"Um… all right," Ranma said blankly, before dismissing it and turning back to Ryoga. "So, any new techniques?"

Ryoga just shook his head mutely, and stared desperately up at the ceiling, which remained blessedly free of unexpected feminine flesh. Kasumi watched on, still concerned. With some alarm, she'd noticed the spiral-sliced remains of Nabiki's camera on the floor, and decided not to push her luck by trying again to talk Ranma down.

"So, you want to talk, huh?" Akane asked, actually starting to get past the totally, stupidly perverse situation she was in — at least for the moment, mainly because Kasumi was there watching to make sure nothing worse happened. A possible means of escape occurred to her. "Do you like me?" With any luck, this would put the redhead off balance. Even if Ranma had somehow gone crazy, she hoped that the question that so often produced heated denials from him would bring him back to normal.

What she was not expecting was for Ranma to turn to her, smile up at her sweetly, and say, "I love you, I think."

"He's only saying that because he's gone insane," Akane assured herself rapidly. "Anyways, why do I care? This is practically rape, I should be furious at him! What does it matter if he said he loves me… wait…" Her train of thought suddenly derailed, and she blinked. "You only think so?!" she demanded angrily.

Ranma nodded. "It's really confusing," she admitted.

"…How is it confusing?" the youngest Tendo asked cautiously, impelled by morbid curiosity.

"Well," Ranma said, pondering and raising her finger to her lips in a pose that had bankrupted half of Nerima's ice cream vendors, "I really like how much you keep trying, even if you won't succeed, but your cooking's not so good… 'cept your curry, o' course… and how you'll try anything… but you usually fail… and your smile… a lot more when I'm a guy, for some reason… and I see it, which isn't very often… and…"

"Something tells me I shouldn't have asked," Akane muttered, desperately wanting to rub her forehead while the disquietingly nude redhead with one arm around her kept on listing various back-handed or wrongly aimed compliments.

"So, why's Ryoga here, if you wanted to talk to me?" she finally demanded, wanting to stop the endless, rambling stream of somewhat insulting praise.

"Oh, I like him too," Ranma said, turning back to her left to hug the Lost Boy, causing him to come inches from blacking out again even though he was still trying feebly to ignore his surroundings. "He's always there to help out… when he's not lost… or trying to kill me, and he's the only guy who can really challenge me in a fight all the time, and I've known him since junior high, and… well, when I'm a girl, that smirk when he's about to show off a new move's kind of nice, even if it's usually when he's being the most annoying… and he smells real good when he ain't P-chan… funny, I only really notice when I'm a girl… and…" she started off again, giving a similar list of examples to those she'd given about Akane, though this time, her voice started to become more and more slurred as she went.

Akane ignored the inexplicable 'when he isn't P-chan' comment out of hand, assuming it was just Ranma's hopefully temporary insanity affecting the bizarre nickname she often used for Ryoga anyway. "Maybe Ranma's a little nuts normally?" she pondered. There was surely no other good reason to call a powerful martial artist by the name of a house pet.

"And… and… I…" Ranma mumbled incoherently, before finally slumping over, asleep, one arm wrapped possessively around each of her chosen martial artists' waists and her head resting on Akane's shoulder.

"Um, do you think he'll be less nuts when he wakes up?" Akane asked, staring nervously down into the blissfully relaxed, surprisingly innocent-looking face of her fiancé.

"I sure hope so, that was really creepy," Ryoga muttered, still staring up at the ceiling and trying desperately to ignore the sensation of his right arm pressed up against Ranma's left breast. "I never knew he was like that, I'll have to pound him later for saying something so embarrassing."

Suddenly, a throat was cleared nearby, and Kasumi stood from the chair at Akane's desk, where she'd settled during Ranma's disjointed monologue. "For now, since Ranma-chan's asleep and likely to stay that way, we should try to help him," she said clearly. Pulling something out of her apron pocket, she walked over to the three, gently unwrapped Ranma's arms from their surprisingly firm position around the other two, and started murmuring comforting words to the redhead.

"Hold Ranma-chan's arm, Ryoga-kun, and squeeze." Akane looked, curious, only to see an object she didn't recognize in her older sister's hand, though it had a needle on one end.

Ryoga nodded, confused, and grabbed Ranma's left arm just above the elbow, squeezing. "Not that hard," Kasumi rebuked gently, and then traced a vein, carefully inserting the needle. After a few moments, in which she fiddled with the device and several small clear cylinders with different colored caps, she looked up. "Ryoga-kun, can you…" she started, and then remembered who she was talking to.

Reaching over to the pigtailed girl's right side, the eldest Tendo nimbly untied the knots holding her younger sister's arms. "Akane, can you take these to Dr. Tofu?" she asked, handing the blue-black–haired girl several of the little cylinders. "Tell him that they are from Ranma, and that I wasn't able to label them."

"Um, all right, Kasumi." agreed Akane, uncertainly studying them, "but what's happening?"

"I'm afraid Ranma may have run into Shampoo or Kodachi again," the Tendo matriarch frowned, brushing some sweat-dampened red hair out of the girl's eyes. "Whatever she was given, it was very strong."

"No!" Akane exclaimed with horror, and rather than taking time to untie the part of the sheet binding her legs, she jumped to her feet and charged from the room without even noticing it, shredding the ill-fated linen almost instantly. The sound of her footsteps pounded down the stairs and then suddenly reversed direction. After a moment she came back in long enough to grab her school uniform, and threw it hurriedly over her head before leaving again.

"Um, what should I do?" Ryoga asked in bewilderment, stuck halfway between clocking the pigtailed bastard and being worried for her. He was definitely not thinking about the amazing sight of a nearly nude Akane in glorious full motion, because he wasn't a pervert like Ranma. He suddenly realized what part of the unconscious redhead he was staring unseeingly at as he most definitely did not think of that wondrous memory, and snapped his head around so quickly he almost ended up with his ever-present bandanna on backwards. His face, neck and chest darkened with a massive blush. He considered virtuously that male rivals had no business having body parts like that.

Kasumi looked up at him for a moment, before determinedly reminding herself that younger men were not THAT interesting even when shirtless, no matter how strong and healthy, then went back to looking Ranma over. The poor quasi-girl was sweating profusely over her entire body, now. "There should be some blankets in the linen closet, could you go and get them?" she asked without thinking.

Determined to be helpful for the always nice Kasumi, Ryoga jumped off the bed, set his direction with great determination, and charged enthusiastically out… of the window.

She sighed in exasperation. Ignoring the impact noises as the Lost Boy hit the ground and continued running right through the property wall, Kasumi resignedly went to get the blankets herself.

HR.

Ranma Saotome's head hurt. That was about all she could think at the moment, as it throbbed and threatened to explode as if she'd guzzled another large bottle of sake, followed it up by eating Akane's cooking, and finally finished things off by taking a running leap into Ryoga's fist. "Ngh," she moaned, contemplating opening her eyes. She really didn't want to, but she also knew that the old man would probably take advantage of her laziness, and the last thing she needed was to be flying through the air.

Bracing herself, the martial artist cracked open one eyelid, and was surprised that she didn't, in fact, see the brightness of the morning sun through her bedroom window, but rather a mop of brown hair. Immediately, she stiffened in shock, and started to try to figure out precisely whom she was in bed with. She could feel hands gently wrapped around her back, further letting her know that she was not wearing a shirt, at least, though fortunately most of the contact with her skin was through soft cloth.

The figure felt female, which meant that she couldn't kill them, and was likely dead herself if the fiancée brigade found out about this. The soft, regular feeling of breath tickling across her neck indicated that the girl was asleep. Slowly, trying to keep this fact true, Ranma turned her head to try and get a look at the face of the person she was cuddled up with. Unfortunately, all she found out was that they were exceptionally tall — the swatch of hair she'd been looking at was part of a ponytail, and her head was nestled rather comfortably into the crook of the woman's neck.

Slowly, she moved one of her hands, grasping the arm that was draped over her and pulled it off before rolling away and to her feet. That was about when she felt air all over her body, realized she was completely naked, and saw the peacefully sleeping face of Kasumi… all at about the same time. "Eep," the redhead whispered, her eyes bulging. She looked around nervously, only to get even worse news: she was standing in Akane's room, though the only clothes she could find were her own. Slipping the outfit on, she idly noticed a stack of yen standing next to them, and her father's natural thieving instinct came into play, causing her to slip the stack into her pocket.

"Oh, you're awake, Ranma…" Nabiki's voice cut through the martial artist's confused, and slightly panicked, morning haze, and she turned to see the middle Tendo staring at her unsteadily.

"Uh, hi, Nabiki," she returned, shooting a look back to Kasumi, and then waiting for the explosion.

"Um, I… just wanted to ask if you could… wake up Kasumi, goodbye!" Nabiki said, turning and quickly moving down the hall.

Ranma blinked slowly. "What the hell's goin' on?" she thought, but had the good sense not to say aloud. The world, it seemed, was bound and determined to descend screaming into the Twilight Zone. Last night, Kodachi Kuno had given her a peace offering, and now she'd woken up curled up with Kasumi, and Nabiki hadn't tried to milk the situation for all it was worth.

There was something fishy going on here, but she wasn't sure what it was, and kind of didn't want to know. After all, every time something bad happened around here, it usually ended up crashing down on her head. Still, if she didn't know, there was a chance that it could come back and bite her, so she decided to take Nabiki's advice and wake up Kasumi, if only to get some answers.

Walking to the bed and reaching over tentatively, the redhead shook the brunette gently by the shoulder. "Hey, Kasumi?" She said, softly. "Kasumi, it's time ta wake up."

The oldest Tendo girl's eyes opened, and she rolled to face Ranma, smiling happily when she saw her. "Good morning Ranma-kun, I see you're feeling better."

"Feeling better?" Ranma asked, confused, and a little irritated at how casually the other girl woke. Apparently Kasumi was a morning person by choice, rather than by necessity.

"Yes," Kasumi said. "You weren't well last night. I don't really know why, but you were so sick that I felt it was best if I watched over you."

"Oh," Ranma said, sighing in relief. "That's all that happened. Musta been Akane's cooking, or something."

"Now Ranma-kun, that's not very nice," Kasumi rebuked, swinging her legs out of bed and straightening her house dress. Sniffing at one arm she frowned, "I don't suppose you could get the kitchen ready while I get changed, could you?"

"Um, yeah, sure," Ranma said, and then her face turned red as Kasumi began to strip her apron off in front of her. "I, um, gotta go," she said quickly, darting out the door.

Holding her apron in her hands, Kasumi blinked. "But… I thought you would want this for the kitchen…" she said, mystified at the young martial artist's reaction.

HR.

"Hey Nabiki!" The middle Tendo sister looked apprehensive as she looked into the kitchen, seeing Ranma, still in female form and cleaning at high speed.

"Um, hi, Saotome," she said, debating the merits of turning around and going back upstairs. Shaking her head, she thought, "C'mon, Tendo. Saotome's an idiot jock, you can't let him intimidate you!" Resolutely, she marched into the room, sat down at the kitchen table, and reached for the paper that her sister usually brought in. Coming up empty, she frowned. "Saotome, can you grab the paper?" she asked, tiredly.

Ranma frowned in slight irritation, but dropped the wash cloth she was using and left the kitchen for a moment, returning with the requested item and dropping it in front of Nabiki. "Here ya go," she said, turning to the fridge and pulling out several vegetables that she knew Kasumi usually used during breakfast.

"So, Saotome, about yesterday, and the crap you pulled," the middle Tendo said, feeling much more confident now that she saw Ranma acting a lot more normal.

"What did I do?" Ranma asked, sounding genuinely puzzled.

The brown-haired girl turned, about to make some sarcastic comment about faking amnesia, when the glinting flurry of metal in front of Ranma caught her eyes. She saw three knives in motion, two dancing on the blade of the third, as Ranma quickly washed vegetables and then fed them through the virtual wood chipper she'd started. Her mouth opened and closed several times, especially as she saw the other turn a look towards her that she could almost believe was true cluelessness.

"What happened yesterday?" Ranma asked again, flicking her wrist in such a way that the two knives bounced up, landing only slightly crookedly in the knife block.

"Erm," Nabiki said, her face going very slightly green. "Nothing, nothing important happened yesterday."

"You sure?" Ranma asked, dumping the cut-up vegetables from the cutting board into a small bowl. "I can't remember anything, but Kasumi said I was sick, and I didn't remember that either."

"No, I'm positive," Nabiki returned. "Yesterday was perfectly normal." Then, she smirked shakily. "Well, as normal as your life ever gets."

"Oh, that's okay, then." Ranma said, as Kasumi entered the room in a brown and white dress.

"Excuse me," Nabiki said, standing and heading for the door. "I've got to get ready for school."

"Huh, wonder what's eatin' her?" Ranma asked, as she stepped back from the counter to let Kasumi take her place.

"It's probably nothing," the older girl assured her. "Thank you for doing all this, Ranma-kun."

"It's no problem, Kasumi," Ranma returned. "The stupid Panda ain't around to do morning sparring, so it was good practice." Turning, she grabbed a kettle she'd put on when she first came down, and dumped it over her head.

"Well, you should get your bath and change clothes, Ranma-kun. If you're feeling well enough, you do need to go to school this morning." Kasumi said, looking over what had been done before she got into the kitchen.

The black haired boy grimaced. "Yay, another day of Kuno and Hinako-sensei," he muttered, but nodded and headed for the kitchen door.

As he exited into the living room, Ranma heard a loud crash, followed immediately by a splash and the sound of a girl screaming bloody murder. Without thinking, he dashed towards the back yard, whence the sound had come, and came to a screeching halt when he saw Akane sitting in the koi pond, shivering violently in her drenched yellow Pajamas.

"Huh?" He asked, looking up to see a giant panda looking down at the scene, complete confusion written across its furry face. "Boy?" it wrote on a sign that it pulled out of nowhere. "Why is your fiancée in the koi pond?"

"I'd ask you the same thing, Pop." Ranma said, deadpan.

Akane, meanwhile, was torn between two targets. The most common one, Ranma, had racked up a lot of must-bash points the night before, but her feelings on him were so conflicted at the moment, due to the same actions, that she didn't immediately start in on him. The second target, on the other hand, was standing staring at her in the second story window, and had the gall to look confused.

"Stupid…" she began, in a low voice, struggling to her feet and ignoring her own violent shivering. "Old…" she continued, slightly louder, as she bent down to grasp a rock at the edge of the pond. "Man!" She screamed this last, tossing the heavy stone with all her might. Sure enough, it flew true, and crashed into Genma's face.

Ranma couldn't help but whistle. "Hey, that was a good shot, Akane," he complimented.

"Thanks," she muttered, and stomped into the house to find a change of clothes.

Ranma just blinked after her for a moment, and then shrugged, deciding that he'd beat up his old man later. Right now, things were far too confusing.

HR.

"I still don't get why ya won't tell me what happened," Ranma complained, as he walked next to his fiancée towards the school. "Nabiki didn't seem ta think it was that bad."

Akane wanted to say something about Nabiki, but decided against it. For once, something Ranma had done to a member of her family didn't annoy her, and if he couldn't remember what had happened, he couldn't be afraid of her sister for it. Quite apart from that, there was no way in hell that she was going to explain what had happened, all the perversion that had occurred. She shuddered.

"Um, you all right, 'Kane?" Ranma asked, worriedly.

"Don't call me that!" the blue-black–haired girl objected, running off towards the school as quickly as she could.

"Hey, wait, what'd I say?!" the confused male martial artist demanded, dashing after her. He was surprised into stopping, however, when the old woman who constantly splashed him with water halted her ladle in the middle of a swing, and waved at him as he ran past.

Coming rapidly to a dead stop, the young martial artist slowly turned around, looking vaguely scared. "You… you stopped before ya hit me?" he asked, looking upon the woman with awe.

"Ah, so you are the same person," she proclaimed. "I thought I recognized those footsteps. You know, you do sound very manly in this form."

Ranma blinked… twice… very slowly. "What?"

"Yes, I worked on enhancing my hearing with my chi. Very taxing most of the time, so I don't normally use it, but I wanted to see you so that we could have our tea," the ladle-bearing woman said.

"Tea?" Ranma asked, stupidly.

"Yes… You are the one with the curse, aren't you? You wanted to learn my sonar techniques, and I offered you a nice visit? It's so rare that I get visitors, you see," she explained, smiling up at him kindly.

"Oh, um, yeah, I'm the one with the curse," Ranma said, slowly. "I'd be, um, glad to come and learn that style from you… but I got school right now. Can I come back tonight?"

"Of course you can, dear," the old woman said, and waved as Ranma turned, starting to run towards school.

"What the hell happened last night?" the martial artist thought once again, now totally confused. At least something good had come out of it, though, if he was going to avoid being splashed every day on his way to school.

Just then, a cascade of cool water fell over Ranma's body, causing it to shift and shrink as he ran. "Damn it," she mumbled, clearing a lock of wet hair from her eyes and glancing back to see a surprised housewife standing at a second story window, empty wash bucket in hand. "I shouldn'ta' thought it," she muttered sourly.

END.


End file.
